Wonderland
by DramaDramaDrama
Summary: Eighteen-year-old Zoey Allen's life is fake, but flawless; or at least as much so as it will ever be. Zoey has accepted the path her life has taken, but just then does a new threat by the name of the Volturi force her to change her life again — only that this time, the changes will live forever. (Volturi member/OC) Dark. Please give it a read.
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer**: I do not own Twilight, Stephenie Meyer does. No copyright infringement is intended, and I am making no financial gain from this.

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><p><em><span>Wonderland<span>_

Prologue

It was a stormy night in late winter, and the snow danced around the windows of the vintage BMW in unique, never repeating patterns, covering the ground under its pale white veil. A brunette girl, awe in her doe-like eyes, intriguedly watched. It was the first snow of the year.

"This is beautiful," she whispered.

The boy to her side gave his neighbour an amused look, snorting. "Not if you're driving, it isn't."

The brunette sighed. "You shouldn't have agreed to drive me, then," she said. "I could have walked, and besides, it's not like the world would end if I didn't show up."

"Theoretically, I'd have to agree with you," the boy commented, "But you_ never_ go out. And you should. You know, be social for an hour or two..."

"Hey!"

"Sorry."

They drove on in silence, and the girl went back to amazedly staring out of her window. The boy, she knew, hated the winter. He despised the cold, the snow, the omnipresent white that seemed to mock him. But she loved it. She enjoyed witnessing the snow fall, seeing it cover up the littered sidewalks and once-green grass, adding its own unique touch of perfection to her hometown. Also, it presented a more than welcome change from the eternal boredom of her day-to-day life. And for that she was more than thankful.

As the dark blue vehicle made a turn to the right, now making its way down a very poorly lit street, the girl witnessed something else.

It was a monotonous sound, almost inaudible in the moment of its first inception, but increasingly growing louder as the car continued driving down the street. It unnerved the girl; she could not quite place the unknown noise — she had never heard quite the likes of it before — and it annoyed her to no end. Only several seconds of time and intense concentration allowed her to finally discover the origin of it, and as she did, she immediately spoke up.

"Stop the car," she ordered. The boy, the smallest of smiles on his thin lips, sighed but complied.

The brunette closed her eyes, concentrating on the noise. "Do you hear that?"

The boy looked back at her in confusion. "Hear what?"

"The screams."

Within the blink of an eye the BMW's doors flew open, the girl emerging from the vehicle in a haste so immense that its possibility had previously been unknown to her. Her companion chased after her, leaving the car behind him, unlocked and with opened doors.

"Wait!" he yelled. "For God's sake, this is dangerous!"

But the girl was determined. "We have to help."

Before he could possibly convince her otherwise, the girl had reached the dark and mysterious back alley, standing at the border of the shadows and taking a deep and pained breath at the terrible and cruel sight before her. Within the blink of an eye the boy had her back, taking her in his arms to save her from any kind of danger. And looking forward, wondering what could have her reacting like this.

There was no movement whatsoever in the alley, he noticed with dread; it was completely isolated. The screams too had died down. But then he directed his eyes further downwards, and saw why.

There she was, the little girl that the screams had originated from — lying in the bright white snow inanimately, the snow near her head having turned into a ghastly crimson that he instantly knew only blood could cause. Her skin had turned sickly pale in death, and her shoes lay several meters away from her corpse; signs of a fight. Her longe blonde curls were crimson at the edges and messy, and her eyes wide open and filled with fright.

She couldn't have been older than eight, he thought in terror. And now she wouldn't live to see the sunset.

"No," a whisper directed his attention back to the trembling brunette in his arms. "No, no, no. She..._oh god_."

The girl adamantly refused to believe what she was seeing.

"God won't help you now."

The girl looked up and froze. There, only few meters infront of her, stood a creature almost as pale as the snow surrounding it, its dark clothes, shining maroon eyes and blood smears near its mouth creating a stark contrast, slowly emerging from the shadows. Cold shivers ran down her back at the sight.

"Wh-who...?"

She never received her answer — instead, the creature sprinted towards her in inhumane speed, its eyes turning from maroon to pitch black. The girl closed her eyes, too cowardly to actually look what she knew to be her death in the eyes and cowering.

Only that death did not come.

She opened her eyes, and just as she did, heard the high-pitched, agonized scream of her driver, who now stood mere centimeters before her, the unknown man biting down into his neck.

Gasping, she realized that he must have sacrificed himself to save her.

"R..r-run...!" the boy managed to croak out in between the screams of intense agony. "G-go...n-now...!"

But she didn't. And with that one decision, she unknowingly changed her entire future.

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><p>AN: Hello there! I got inspired listening to Taylor Swift's 'Wonderland' yesterday (hence the title), and here it is now, the first of many updates to come. This will be both a tragic and dramatic romance story, the story line will be slightly complex, the chapters will be long and updates frequent (about once a week). Also, our heroine will fall for a member of the Volturi, but all of that in due time.

For now, please leave me a review with your opinion and, if you liked this, remember to follow or favorite this story. Thank you in advance, and until soon! x


	2. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

_Wonderland_ was a both eerily dark and absurdly fascinating place, Zoey Allen thought to herself as she watched more and more visitors trickle in, seeing the first of many to come rush into the establishment in a never ending race for the best seats — the ones which possessed the best views onto the colorless, gray-in-gray street that stretched on endlessly outside of the small, square windows as if their existences depended on it. The young waitress shook her head in disbelief. She would never understand the appeal of her workplace, but she was grateful for its mysterious appeal either way.

It was early morning. The sun had just gone up several minutes ago, coloring the sky in an especially beautiful shade of light red, and the emerald-eyed woman with the angelic face and quiet attitude let out a melancholic sigh, letting the last year or so pass before her mental eye. She was lucky to have gotten the job, she told herself, just like she had done every day since she had started working at the legendary _Wonderland Café and Bar_. Things could have turned out much worse for her.

But today, she had trouble believing that.

"Zoey!"

Immediately she slipped out of her trance, reopening her eyes and seeing her minimally older co-worker wildly gesture for her to help her. She complied without second thought, sprinting towards the mahogany-haired woman with the everlasting look of annoyance plastered onto her face and aided her in cleaning a dirty table for new customers.

"What had you so occupied there?"

Zoey shrugged. "Nothing," she lied, yawning. "I just tried to remember if I'd shut the kitchen window before I left." Reluctantly, she added, "Sorry."

"Well," Zoey's co-worker demanded, "did you? 'Cause it's supposed to rain today, or so I've heard."

"Pretty sure, yeah."

"Sure?"

"Yes, Lila. As sure as it gets."

The woman named Lila rolled her eyes. "Just making sure, you know. The last thing I need is to come home from work to see my kitchen flooded."

And the waitresses were back to silence.

It's curious, Zoey thought. Lila and her were co-workers, they lived in a shared apartment above the restaurant, they had spent almost every day of the previous year together — and still, they did not manage to get past the small-talk.

"Lila," one of the regulars called out from the back of the café. The woman in question shyly smiled.

"Well, I gotta go," she excused herself while walking off. "Sorry!"

Zoey cleaned the remainder of the table in silence.

As she returned the sponge and drying cloth to the back of the restaurant, she buried her face behind her hands, her back slowly sliding back the wall until she was sitting on the dusty 50's style tiles, her skinny knees pushed into her ribs.

She could not do this much longer, she realized. She was forced to endure, she knew as much, but sooner or later, she would break.

After a year of this artificial, merry façade, Zoey felt like crying. But she could not even do that. Because, what if Lila would hear? What if she started to ask questions? What then?

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><p>Several hours later, as Zoey and her colleague walked up the stairs to their apartment in silence, Zoey realized that Lila and herself were as different as it could get. Where Zoey kept her thoughts to herself, Lila made a point of speaking her mind without the merest of boundaries; where Zoey did a good job of hiding her disappointment at her way of life, Lila constantly seemed, aesthetically at least, as if she was carrying the weight of the world on her broad shoulders. The two women had next to nothing in common.<p>

And so it was not surprising at all that once they had checked to see if or if not the kitchen had been flooded during the day, they quietly retreated into their separate rooms, not to hear from each other again until the next morning.

Zoey let herself fall onto her bed with a groan, regarding her room. It was small, scarcely furnished and as un-personal as it could possibly get. She had deliberately kept it that way. There were no photos, no books, no flowers, no decorations whatsoever. Nothing to remind anyone who entered it of who inhabited it. To the right of the door, there were a small bed and a nightstand with a lamp, and on the other side of it stood a desk with a non-descript chair and a wardrobe.

And that was it. This was what her life consisted of now — cleaning tables, serving customers, spending the evenings in her little prison cell of a room.

Had someone told her a year ago that this was how she was going to spend her adult life, she would have surely laughed him out.

Zoey sighed and took her cellphone out of her jeans pocket. She pressed the 'on' button, the display lighting up only seconds later, and she sat up as she saw the time. Zoey quickly changed from her _Wonderland_ work uniform into a hoodie, a fresh pair of jeans and a pair of trainers, combed her long brunette hair and left the apartment. She did not say goodbye to Lila. What would she have cared, anyway.

The brunette sped down the staircase and ran onto the street, finding her second hand Renault between the cars parked infront of the door. She was late, and therefore made a point of hastily turning on the engine and racing down the street to save time.

This was the last, perhaps most unusual part of her daily routine.

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><p>When Zoey finally arrived at the national park an hour later, she took her usual route under the hole in the fence which the guards had not yet noticed and ran to the gigantic forest, whose first line of trees began a mere hundred meters from her own, personal entrance.<p>

She gulped as she took the first step into the darkness of the forest, a feeling of unease filling her.

Hopefully, _he_ had fed.

"Noah?" she called out cautiously. "Are you there?"

"Yup," a deep, harmonic voice answered from above her. Zoey turned, a smile brightening up her face as she took in the sight of the dark-haired, pale creature with the crimson irises sitting in the branches of a tree which was located several meters infront of her.

"How's it going?" she asked.

Noah shrugged. "Good, I suppose. I had a couple of teens for dinner today. Stupid kids keep sneaking into the park."

Zoey nodded politely, having learned within the last year not to bother leading discussions on feeding habits with a vampire — it could only possibly end in one's disadvantage.

"How's life in _Wonderland_?"

"Okay," she replied simply. She was in no mood to share her problems today.

"If you say so. Hey, I have a question for you, by the way."

"Oh yeah?"

"I've more or less imprisoned myself in this forest for a year now because you suggested that I should. I won't rip anyone's throats out, I promise. At least not in public. Can we please go out together more often than once in two weeks? I yearn for entertainment."

"Erm..." Zoey thought about it for a moment. "If you say so, I suppose..."

"Awesome," Noah smirked. "Thanks."

A moment of awkward silence later, Zoey spoke up.

"It's the anniversary today, you know?"

The vampire looked down at her in interest. "Anniversary of what, if I may ask?"

"Of... of you being like _this_."

"Oh," the dark-haired creature said. "I'd completely forgotten."

Another moment of silence.

"I wonder how _they_ are," the girl thought out loud. "They must feel so betrayed, thinking that we ran away from them..."

"Well, to be fair," Noah added, "We didn't run away _because_ of them."

"You're right," Zoey nodded. "But that doesn't make it any better."

She sighed. "Don't you miss it? You're life before this?"

"I guess," he said. "I don't really mind. It's not that bad, really, being a vamp. Kinda has its perks." Noah looked down at Zoey. "But you do. I can see it in your eyes. You miss it really, really badly."

The brunette sighed once more. "I've had better days," she replied. _Better years, more like it_. "Not that it matters much."

"It should, though," Noah commented. "Aren't you happy here?"

"I guess I am," she said.

"Why do you miss it, then?"

Because nothing she did held any meaning any more. Because when she woke up in the mornings, she woke up in the life of a stranger. Because she seemed to do nothing for herself anymore, and all for him.

Because life had turned into just another item to check off on her to-do list.

"I don't know," she whispered. "No reason."

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><p>As Zoey lay in bed that night, the usual silence disturbed by the sound of a sitcom her roommate was watching on the other side of her wall, she could not sleep. She tossed and turned, pressing her eyes closed with all the force she could muster, but in vain.<p>

The brunette opened her eyes. The trees outside of her window threw bony, skeleton-like shadows on her floor, lighting up the room with their nightmare inducing presence. Zoey sighed, sitting up. A memory kept playing in her mind.

_The snow fell relentlessly, forcing her to keep her eyes to the ground. She ran through the newly fallen snow, leaving her footsteps, running for her life. People where starting to call after her, yelling at her to stop and come back. A single tear left her eyes. _

_The night may have been white, but it most certainly was not silent._

_The boy in her arms was screaming in agony, kicking and rolling around in her arms. Blood fell from a wound on his neck, leaving small crimson droplets in the snow. She tried to soothe him, to coaxe him into silence, but to no avail — his pained screams only increased in volume._

_"I'm coming after you!" a male voice called after her. "You better stop right where you are, Miss!"  
><em>

_She took a deep breath and ran even faster, her legs aching so much that she half thought they would give out. Within seconds she had reached the car, throwing the agonized boy onto the backseat and hastily starting the car.  
><em>

_Moments later, she had disappeared into the night._

Zoey sighed, closing her eyes. "Happy anniversary of falling down the rabbit hole."

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><p>Author's Note: Did you like it? I originally wanted to make it about three thousand words, but then realized I'd probably bore you to death with more details of the café and Zoey's apartment. I hope this was okay to read — please leave me some feedback :)<p>

I know this is probably not what you expected after the prologue... I promise the next chapter will be much more interesting, though, as the Volturi will make their entrance. So, until then!


	3. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

The next day passed exactly as its predecessor had, without even the smallest of differences.

Zoey had stood up early in the morning, staring blankly at a wall for several minutes before gathering the power to leave bed, had quietly eaten a scarce breakfast with her roommate and without speaking another word, rushed down to _Wonderland_ in her work uniform.

Just like yesterday, she put on a mask of happiness to distract the world from the vast emptiness hidden behind her eyes. Just like yesterday, nobody saw through it.

By the time lunch time rolled around, Zoey was dead tired. She was used to the tiresome work that consisted not only of attending to customers, but making customers want to be attended by her by now — somehow though, her daily visit at the national park yesterday had drained the eighteen-year-old a little more than usually. Zoey sighed, impatiently watching the vintage wall clock. Only one more minute, and she would have gained freedom for half an hour.

Only one more minute, and she would be allowed to hide away somewhere and let her mask drop.

"Ms Allen?"

She turned around. A customer she had never seen before, greasy black hair framing his uneven, juvenile features, stared her down expectantly, a triumphant smirk on his thin lips as she politely made her way towards him.

"Welcome to _Wonderland_," she said apathetically. "Today's special is chicken casserole. What would you like to drink?"

The customer did not answer, instead taking in his waitress's features in sudden wonder. Several awkward seconds passed before Zoey politely coughed.

"Is anything the matter, sir?"

"Ms Allen," he repeated, obviously reading the name off Zoey's name tag. "Excuse me, but don't I know you...?"

Zoey's heart threatened to explode in her chest.

She froze. No, she told herself, this could not be, not now, not after all this time of hiding...

"I'm sorry, sir," she gulped nervously. "You must have me mixed up with someone."

Another devilishly long moment of silence passed, the customer continuing to intriguedly stare at Zoey and Zoey continuing to seem as confident as possible, before the customer laughed out loud, patting Zoey on the shoulder.

"Just playing with ya, sweetie," he said. "Why so tense?"

"I-I.." she stammered, "You know what, I'm sorry, but I'm on my lunch break. My colleague will be with you shortly."

And she sprinted away in utter desperation and embarrassment before the customer could object.

Zoey reached the back of the restaurant in record time, noticing Lila sitting in a corner, smoking a cigarette and boredly playing on her cellphone.

"Lila," she exclaimed. "There's a customer who needs to be waited on, and I'm on my lunch break."

Lila merely shrugged. The short girl slowly stood up, stepped onto her cigarette, killing the flames, and walked away into the direction of the restaurant. "Sure," she said. "See you later."

Zoey wordlessly nodded, looking after her friend as she walked out of the safety of the private back of the restaurant. When Zoey was sure that Lila was out of hearing and seeing range, she closed her eyes, letting the tears run freely.

For a few minutes, she was herself.

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><p>Zoey finally ventured out of her hiding spot a little less than ten minutes later, her eyes slightly puffy, her carefully applied mascara minimally messed up. If anybody had dared to look closely at the supposedly happy, shy waitress, they would have surely noticed it. Within seconds they would have understood that she was anything close to happy.<p>

But for that, they would have had to look.

She hastily left _Wonderland_, walking into the town center to look for a bite to eat.

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><p>A few minutes earlier and several hundred kilometers away, a group of five pale, golden-eyed creatures bid its blackly cloaked visitors farewell.<p>

"Well," a golden-eyed woman with strawberry blond curls spoke up, "I hope that your stay in Alaska was to your liking. Please, greet your Masters from us."

"Of course," a little girl, her angelic face half-hidden by her cloak, apathetically answered. "We are satisfied to see that in our absence, you have not broken any laws. Please continue not to do so. The Volturi do not give second chances."

"We'll keep it in mind," the strawberry blonde smiled.

"Farewell, then."

Within the blink of a human eye, the black cloaks were gone.

They sped through the vast landscapes of rural Alaska as a unit, not once stopping. After their once-a-century compulsory visit to the Denali coven, the elite Volturi guard had one destination and one goal only — Volterra.

They were swift, graceful in their movements, even now, as they were not trying to impress. Millennia of practice had made it impossible for the Volturi to be anything but perfect in their movements; both to install fear in their enemies and attract their prey. Any human witnessing their sprint by accident would surely have mistaken the pale figures in their pure black cloaks for a long, translucent piece of luxurious black silk, quickly yet with somehow disturbing beauty dancing in the wind.

Several minutes later, the eyes of a boy, his face holding a strange similarity to the apathetic girl, blackened in thirst, and he impulsively stopped running.

"Alec," the girl hissed. "What are you doing? We must continue traveling. Aro is expecting our return."

The boy named Alec rolled his eyes. "Do you see that city in the distance?" he asked. "It's big enough that a few missing humans would not cause suspicion. I think we should hunt."

The other two males nodded in agreement. They too longed for nutrition.

There was silence for a moment, then the girl said "Fine," giving in. "But let us be quick and clean. We have no time to waste."

The four vampires gave each other one last look of agreement, then sped away into another direction, towards the town. Within seconds they passed a sign that welcomed them in Whitehorse, and only moments after, they were in the city.

It was noon. Many humans were out, just like them looking for something that would satisfy their hunger. Were the guards careless, they would have grabbed the first group of four they would have found and drained them dry. But they were not careless. This was not their city, and they would have to be careful not to draw attention to them or their actions. And so they patiently waited, hiding in an alley.

"Unaccompanied humans," the girl ordered. "Ones that seem unimportant. Don't let them scream."

Alec found his prey first. The man was old, in his sixties, and smelled of alcohol. The vampire numbed him before draining him, making it impossible for his victim to make a sound. His fellow guard members followed his example soon after. Within the course of few minutes, three corpses, two young girls and one middle-aged woman, kept the old man company in the back of the alley and the guards' eyes were back to bright crimson.

"What now?" a tall vampire asked. "We can't simply leave them here."

"I smell water nearby," the girl observed. "There must be a lake within the city walls, Felix. I suggest we drop the bodies off there and then continue our journey."

"Sounds good, Jane."

Utilizing their full speed to assure that nobody would see them, the small congregation followed Jane as she led the way to a lake. Fortunately there were no humans nearby, and so they made a point of finding the deepest part and throwing their victims into the lake there.

They were just about to turn around and leave the town once and for all when Jane said, "We are not the only immortals here."

The guards froze. Officially, Canada was one of the few vampire-free countries that still existed in the world. This could not be good.

"Aro _will_ be interested to know," she added.

"We should follow this vampire's scent," Alec replied. "Maybe he is just passing through, like us."

Jane laughed and pointed at a newspaper stand nearby. The headline read _Three Missing — Number of Unlocated Missing Persons Rises To Twenty_.

"Maybe not," Felix noted.

"I still think that we should follow this vampire," Alec said, adding: "The Masters will appreciate this knowledge when making a decision of what is to be done."

"I agree," the fourth guard spoke up. He was almost as tall as Felix, and his hair was messy.

Jane sighed. "We will stay to make sure that the vampire is not causing any turmoil. But we leave for Volterra by the evening."

"Agreed," Alec smiled.

They quickly tracked the vampire down, following his scent until they eventually found him sitting on a bench in the city center. It was a cloudy day, and the newborn could be in the open without fearing to be exposed by the sun. He seemed relaxed, at ease almost. He was tall, slender, had short brown hair and the shockingly bright crimson eyes of a newborn.

To avoid being detected, they sat down in a dark café with a good view of the city center, still being able to see and hear the newborn due to their advanced senses.

"Jane," the messy haired guard said. "He can't be older than a year. We have to get him out of here, make sure he doesn't go on a rampage."

Just then, a shy-seeming human walked by, half-covering her face behind her long, brunette hair. The vampire smiled, looked around himself to see several other humans, and called out "Zoey!"

"Demetri," Jane replied, "I think we should see why he knows the name of this mortal first."

The shy human turned, noticing the vampire stare expectantly at her, and, her eyes widening in both surprise and dread, smiled. "Noah!" she cried out. The human hastily ran over to the newborn, then whispered, "What on Earth are you doing here?"

"She knows him?" Jane asked, perplexed.

"You said I could go out into town more often," the newborn named Noah replied smugly. "And here I am, doing exactly that."

The girl named Zoey sighed, then demanded: "Have you fed this morning?"

"Oh for f*ck's sake," Felix cried out. "She knows?!"

"_Silence_," Jane hissed. "He'll hear us."

Noah glared at the girl, then shook his head. "Why would I if I just had those three teens yesterday?"

The human was obviously irritated by now. "Maybe because you were planning on_ sitting in a place full of people_?"

The newborn smirked. "And here I was, thinking you held even an ounce of trust in me."

"I... I do trust you." Instantly, Zoey turned from offensive to defensive.

"You better," the newborn said.

"Look, Noah," the girl sighed, "I'm sorry, but I came out here to get a bite to eat. I'm going to have to go now."

But Noah held her back.

"Look, _Zoey_," he replied, mocking the human. His eyes turned pitch black. "I want to get _a bite_, too. There were other people sneaking into the park just as I left. I could have had them. You know why I didn't? Because I thought, why don't I surprise the one person that remotely cares about me in her lunch break today? The least you could do to appreciate my sacrifice is be hungry with me. _Sit back down_."

Fear evident in her eyes, Zoey sat back down.

"She's either completely brave or a completely coward," Alec remarked. "I can't seem to figure out which one."

"I'll need to get back to _Wonderland_ in a few minutes," the girl said. "My lunch break is finite."

Noah shrugged. "Then stay with me just a little longer."

"Promise me you'll go straight back to the park when I'm gone." There was desperation in Zoey's voice.

"Just trust me!"

"Noah..."

"Okay, okay." He gave in. "You win."

"This weirdly reminds of Isabella and Edward Cullen's relationship," Demetri commented.

"There was a man in the restaurant today," Zoey said, trying to make conversation. "He thought he recognized me from somewhere. I almost had a heart attack. He said that he was only joking, though."

"What?!" Noah cried out. "Zoey, you really need to be a little more attentive. What if... what if he'd actually known you?"

"He didn't," she sighed. "Besides, I'm already paranoid enough."

"I don't care if you had to be a hundred times more paranoid, if only that meant you'd be able to assure that such things wouldn't happen."

Zoey merely shook her head in disbelief in response.

"I don't get it," she finally replied.

"What is there not to get?"

"Why do you care so much?"

Noah cast his gaze downwards.

"Because," he answered, "After I became this, you promised me something. You promised me you'd never leave me. That you'd always be there for me. And I _need_ you. I need you to be there for me. You wouldn't understand why, but for me, everything depends on it." He sighed. "Please just trust me. I need you to be careful, so that you can always be there for me. Promise me?"

"I promise."

"I've seen enough," Jane snarled. "Poor girl. Let us leave, the Masters will want to decide what to do with them."

Instantaneously, they were on their way.

* * *

><p>Author's Note: I hope you liked it! Please leave me a review. Sadly, eventhough this story has gotten way over a hundred views so far, I've only gotten three reviews up until now, which, again, is a bit sad. So please, if you are reading this and liked it, it won't take long but it'll make my day. Three reviews for the next chapter!<p>

Also, it's deliberate that you don't know much about Noah and Zoey. I want to make it kind of a mystery, but it will be revealed by Chapter Eight. And I'll leave the occasional clue on the way :)


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